Subsection (b). Few laws recognize a time limit for impeachment by proving a conviction. However, practical considerations of fairness and relevance require that a certain limit be recognized. See Ladd, Credibility Tests – Current Trends, 89 U.Pa.L.Rev. 166, 176–177 (1940). This part of the rule follows from the proposal made in the Proposing Recommendation in the Code of Evidence, § 788(5), p. 142, Cal.Law Rev.Comm`n (1965), although it was not adopted. See California Evidence Code §788. The amendment applies the general balancing test of Rule 403 to protect all litigants from the unfair dismissal of witnesses. The balancing test protects the civil parties, the government in criminal cases and the defendant in criminal proceedings who calls other witnesses.
The amendment refers to previous convictions under section 609, not for other purposes, and therefore does not contradict Davis v. Alaska, 415 U.S. 308 (1974). Davis involved the use of a previous minor judgment, not to prove a previous violation of the law, but to prove bias. In a criminal case, the accused has the right to prove the bias of a witness and to be assured of a fair trial, without, however, unduly prejudicing a trier of fact. See General Article 412. Of course, in all cases where the court of first instance considers that the rights of confrontation require the admission of evidence of impeachment, the Constitution would prevail over the rule. Prior to the amendment, the rule appeared to give the defendant the advantage of the special balancing test when defence witnesses other than the defendant were called to testify. In practice, however, the fear of injustice towards the accused is more acute when the accused`s own beliefs are presented in evidence. Almost all cases decided involve this type of indictment, and the amendment does not deprive the accused of meaningful protection, as section 403 now clearly protects against an unfair indictment of a defence witness other than the accused.
There are cases where an accused may be biased when a defence witness is charged. Such cases may occur, for example, if the witness has a special relationship with the accused, so that the defendant is likely to suffer some ripple effect from the indictment of the witness. As a means of impeachment, evidence of a conviction for a crime is relevant only because it serves as evidence of the commission of the underlying crime. There is little disagreement with the general thesis that at least some crimes are relevant to credibility, but many disagreements between cases and commentators about which crimes can be used for this purpose. See McCormick §43; 2 Wright, Federal Practice and Procedure; Criminal law § 416 (1969). The weight of traditional authority was to allow the use of crimes in general, regardless of the nature of the offence, and of crimen falsi, regardless of the degree of the offence. This is the view accepted by Congress in 1970 in the amendment to § 14-305 of the Code of the District of Columbia, P.L. 91-358, 84 Stat. 473. Uniform Rule 21 and Rule 106 of the Model Code only allow crimes involving “dishonesty or false testimony”. Others felt that the trial judge should have the discretion to exclude a conviction if the probative value of the evidence of the offence is largely offset by the risk of unfair disadvantage. Luck v.
United States, 121 U.S.App.D.C. 151, 348 F.2d 763 (1965); McGowan, Impeachment of Criminal Accused by Prior Condemnations, 1970 Law & Soc. Order 1. Whatever the merits of these views, this rule is formulated in such a way that it is consistent with the policies of Congress manifested in the 1970 legislation. The second amendment introduced by the amendment removes a lack of clarity as to the relationship between articles 609 and 403 with regard to the indictment of witnesses other than the criminal accused. See Green v. Bock Laundry Machine Co., 109 pp. ct. 1981, 490 U.S. 504 (1989). The amendment does not interfere with the special balancing test for the defendant who chooses to testify.
Thus, the rule recognizes that in virtually all cases where previous convictions are used to charge the defendant who testifies, the defendant faces a unique risk of deprivation – that is, the risk that convictions handed down at Fed.R.Evid. 404 is misused by a jury as evidence of inclination, although they are introduced exclusively for impeachment purposes. While the rule does not prohibit the use of convictions to remove an accused, it does require the government to prove that the probative value of convictions as evidence of impeachment outweighs their detrimental effect. The proposed rule contains certain fundamental safeguards that apply to all witnesses, but are of particular importance to a defendant who chooses to testify. These guarantees include the imposition of certain time limits, proven rehabilitation and general exclusion from proceedings before the juvenile courts. Subsection (a). For the purposes of impeachment, the rule divides offences into two categories: (1) those that are generally considered a criminal offence, regardless of the nature of the offence, and (2) those that involve dishonesty or false testimony, regardless of the degree of the offence. Provable convictions are not limited to violations of federal law. Because of our constitutional structure, the federal catalog of crime is far from complete and state laws must be used to specify many crimes. For example, simple theft against the theft of interstate trade. Other examples of borrowings include the Assimilative Crimes Act, which makes state criminal law applicable to the special territorial and maritime jurisdiction of the United States, 18 U.S.C. §13, and the provision of the Judicial Code disqualifying individuals as jurors on the basis of state and federal convictions, 28 U.S.C.
§1865. For the assessment of crime in terms of severity, reference is made to congressional measurement of crimes (with a prison sentence of more than one year) rather than adopting widely varying state definitions. See 28 U.S.C. §1865, supra, which excludes jurors from a state or federal court conviction punishable by imprisonment for more than one year. Evidence of a conviction under this rule is not admissible if more than ten years have elapsed since the date of release imposed by the witness for his or her last conviction or the expiry of the period of probation, probation or sentence granted or imposed for his or her most recent conviction. whichever comes last. The amendment further divides subsection (a) into paragraphs (1) and (2), thus facilitating research under the current computer-aided research programmes, which distinguish between the two provisions.